Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

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Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by GodIsADeeJay81 » Sat Jan 23, 2021 2:05 pm

Article from the Athletic

Bramall Lane should be going green on Saturday afternoon. In different times, in better times, Plymouth Argyle would have 5,000 fans travelling north to south Yorkshire for a fourth-round FA Cup tie. From noon they would be arriving in Sheffield, heading for a pint in the Howard opposite the station or circling Sheffield United’s ground, pocketing a programme, queuing outside the chippy on Shoreham Street.

But there will be none of this, there will be no Pilgrims progressing across England, just as there were no Wolves fans travelling to Chorley in hope of revenge on Friday evening. There won’t be thousands of Wednesday fans exiting Sheffield for Goodison Park, or Blackpool supporters travelling in number for their match at Brighton’s Amex Stadium; Luton, who have not played at Chelsea for 27 years, would have filled an end of Stamford Bridge; and of course Liverpool would have taken so many to Old Trafford all police leave would have been cancelled. For those fans, this weekend would have been one of the biggest of the season.

Every weekend England bears witness to these tribes shuttling across the country, meeting at arranged locations or bumping into each other at service stations or on train platforms. This FA Cup fourth round would have been a bumper version.

But coronavirus has placed all travel on hold, and as Kevin Miles of the Football Supporters’ Association says: “Travelling to support football is a habit and it’s a habit that’s been broken. It remains to be seen how many will get back into the habit. We’d argue that away fans are a bit of an endangered species, something that needs to be preserved and encouraged.”

The away fan is a particular staple of English football and has been virtually since the game turned professional 130 years ago. As Greg Foxsmith of the London branch of Plymouth Argyle supporters puts it of Bramall Lane: “We’d have sold out, just as we’d have sold out Huddersfield in the last round. We hold the away record turnout at the Emirates.”

Plymouth took 9,000 fans to Arsenal in the Cup in 2009, and more recently took over 8,500 to Anfield in 2017. Argyle, like Grimsby Town or Carlisle, are one of those geographically-challenged lower division clubs for whom away wins are nearly as rare as trophies, yet who can be counted on to take large numbers on the road every other Saturday. Or midweek.


Some of the 8,500 Plymouth fans who travelled to Liverpool in 2017 (Photo: Getty)
Relegated to League Two in 2019, Plymouth began the 2019-20 season under new manager Ryan Lowe, whose first game was at Crewe Alexandra. Argyle took 1,700 fans on the 500-mile round trip for a fourth-division match and their new Liverpudlian manager was astonished and beguiled.

“It was one of the reasons I joined the club, because I knew the fanbase was massive,” Lowe says. “When we pulled up at Crewe for the first game, on the right-hand side of us they were banging on the windows, the flags were out. It was like when I used to go to Wembley and watch Liverpool coming in on the coach. That’s what it reminded me of. I thought ‘Wow’. Then when I got out and saw the whole end was full, I was thinking: ‘Yes, this is rocking.’”

Plymouth won 3-0 and Lowe’s opinion is that “100 per cent” it was down to the presence of away fans he describes as “noisy and effective”.

It is therefore no surprise that Lowe is “disappointed” there will be no green support at Bramall Lane, though he understands the pandemic reasoning.

As to when away fans might be seen in their usual place inside grounds, Miles of the FSA says: “Those of us who spent months at the end of 2020 working to establish protocols to enable fans to get back into grounds had to accept away fans were probably the last group to return. With the return even of home fans paused, sadly it seems to be the case that we’ll not get away fans back in grounds this season.”

Sheffield United know all about the FA Cup and away fans. There were more than 110,000 people at the 1901 FA Cup final and while there is no definitive figure as to how many of them wore Sheffield red, contemporary reports suggest the tally was at least 30,000.

The 1890s in England and Scotland was professional football’s first boom time. Rising attendances at the Cup final charted the surge in football’s popularity — from 42,000 in 1895 to 74,000 in 1899 and then, for Tottenham Hotspur versus Sheffield United in 1901, the first crowd of over 100,000. These finals were held at the old Crystal Palace stadium in south London with Blades-Spurs having the extra appeal of a first north-south clash of the professional era.

Under a headline of “The Exodus from Sheffield”, the Sheffield Daily Telegraph reported two days before the game: “On all three railway systems big business is being done.” It said between 150 and 200 saloon carriages had already been booked and they expected many more. It concluded the number of travelling Sheffield United followers “should not be far off that freely talked of in London — well over 20,000.”

The article referred to the 1899 final, which Sheffield United had won 4-1 against Derby County, and stated that fervour was “far in advance of that known two years ago.” A new sporting phenomenon was upon us: football’s away fans.

“Football took off in the 1890s, there was just this huge appetite to attend games,” says Paul Brown, author of Savage Enthusiasm, a history of football supporters. “And the only way to see football then was to watch it in person. You had to go.

“The alternative was that you waited outside a newspaper office for a telegram or carrier pigeon to arrive with the score. There was no other way of knowing and there are reports of people outside newspaper offices watching these pigeons fly in. Imagine the cheering, the anticipation as a pigeon came into sight.”

There was much sociological analysis of this new breed of “fan”, a term first used in England in 1913. The late 19th century Factory Acts passed in parliament had brought extra free time for workers on Saturday afternoons and football was affordable. The fact football is a brilliant sport was of course fundamental, but Brown cites newspaper commentary about Aston Villa fans boarding trains to go to Sunderland for a match and the “romance” of the journey. They were “spectators” then, who became “followers”. “Fanatics” or “fans” came later, a term imported from American baseball coverage.

Before the 1901 Cup final the Sheffield Independent considered other explanations for the boom in away fans — “There is, in the first place, local patriotism.” An example of it could be seen in the name of Brighton & Hove Albion — a combination of geographic place and poetic Englishness — though Brown says “local patriotism existed long before football.

“If you take Blackburn and Burnley, those towns were rivals before football. They were rivals as industrial mill towns, but now they had a new means to channel their rivalry. Blackburn Rovers or Blackburn Olympic were wanting their team to beat Burnley to show their dominance as a town. Football was a vessel for their local patriotism and, for away fans, you’d want to go onto their turf to show that.

“It wasn’t just a negative thing, about derision, it was about pride in your own town. It was benign. There was a sense of belonging, camaraderie — this need to be there, to be part of it. There was the supporting aspect: they knew their team was away and they wanted to help it win and their presence gave them a better chance.”

Clearly the hooliganism of the late 1960s through to 1980s distorted the general impression of the away fan and, when asked for the changes he noted from the 1901 fan to the 2021 version, Brown replies: “You know what? I noticed more similarities than changes.”


Meetings between Liverpool and United just aren’t the same without two sets of fans (Photo: Getty)
Foxsmith’s experience of following Plymouth supports Brown’s statement. His first away game was Argyle’s 3-0 defeat at Wigan Athletic in 1986. The journey was taken on a supporters’ bus, as was some cider by the young teenager and his mates, and he has been going ever since, even though he and thousands of others have left Plymouth.

“Our away support is divided into two distinct camps,” Foxsmith explains, “firstly the Plymouth-based fans who have enormous logistical difficulties as the most-travelled away support in terms of mileage, and the second group, the Plymouth diaspora.”

Regional unemployment and the Londonization of the economy from 1980 meant tens of thousands of local fans brought their local patriotism to the capital. As Foxsmith says: “From the recession of the 1980s onwards, Plymouth, like a lot of industrial towns, haemorrhaged jobs when our biggest employer, the dockyard, lost about 90 per cent of its workforce.

“Many people from Plymouth moved, and you’ll find Plymouth fans all around the country. For some of us, away games are often easier to attend than home games and for us, following Argyle away becomes an important link to our roots. We miss not only Plymouth Argyle, but Plymouth, family, our friends. So travelling away is how you can bond with fellow Plymouth expats. If that makes sense.”

Plymouth’s geography means each away day is an endurance test — Bramall Lane is a 600-mile round trip but to Foxsmith and the other long-distance travellers “the journey becomes as much a part of the day as the match.

“It’s about the camaraderie, the day out. Obviously, the 90 minutes of football is small proportionately to the travel time. I think fans look on the away trip experience in total, rather than just focusing on the 90 minutes. It’s planning, how you travel, who you travel with. And your away wins are cherished all the more when, comparatively, they’re rare.

“Away support is more vociferous, louder. I suppose it’s the hardcore fans, the really passionate ones who go away. That reinforces the enjoyment. It’s one of the opportunities to be in a heaving, visceral noise and if you have to put in extra commitment for that, you’re still going to have more fun than when you’re at home the next Saturday.”

Miles, who is a home-and-away Newcastle United fan as well as chief executive of the FSA, agrees. “An anthropologist would have a field day considering the whole ritual,” he says. “Because of the partisan nature of football, the fact you’re on ‘hostile’ territory and in a minority inside the ground, the role of supporting your team develops a bit of a siege mentality. Because you’re away, you also feel a bit of an underdog. Collectively you’ve had to put the effort in to get there. There’s a stronger group mentality, you’re in one corner together, not scattered around. There’s a strong identity in your ‘otherness’ compared to the home fans. It’s almost like home fans squared.

“The FSA has had an umbrella campaign slogan ‘Away Fans Matter’ since 2013 in which we describe away fans as ‘the distilled essence of football supporters’. With the distances travelled, the time invested, away fans have a kudos even among their own fanbase. The ones who are able to go to all away games have kudos among their peer group because of the sacrifices involved. You get a hardcore who go to all the games. They tend to have more of their life built around the game, football has more importance in their life.”

Brown adds another factor: “The routine of going to away matches, there’s something extra special about it. Especially if you win.

“You come back home and you feel almost like you’ve achieved something. ‘We’ve brought three points back’. It’s more difficult to get to an away game, it’s more difficult to win an away game — there’s a sense of achievement.”

As Kevin Miles speculates, there may be no away fans inside grounds this season. If so, could it be 2022 before away fans return? Travelling on packed buses, in cars or public transport — the away fan experience is often the polar opposite of social distancing.

But although football at the top level has continued seemingly successfully as a television sport during the pandemic, Miles thinks television will definitely welcome the away fans’ return as much as the fans themselves.

“In terms of generating atmosphere at grounds, away fans are absolutely crucial,” he says. “A good home atmosphere tends to be sparked by an away presence. And atmosphere is a huge part of the television ‘product’ being sold by broadcasters.

“The Premier League, by a distance, is the biggest seller and revenue generator of any league in the world. The quality of football in other leagues may be as good if not better, if judged, say, by the winners of the Champions League. It is the atmosphere that sets the Premier League apart.

“Some of the Premier League’s own research from a few years ago about audience attitudes underlined that. They surveyed Thai fans in Thailand about the idea of playing, for example, a Liverpool-Man United match in Bangkok. The Premier League were perhaps surprised to find that, overwhelmingly, Thai fans said: ‘We would rather have the chance one day of one of us going to Old Trafford or Anfield to watch that match rather than have it here — because it wouldn’t be a proper Liverpool-Man United match if it was in Bangkok’. They wanted the atmosphere from Anfield or Old Trafford. They really prized that.”

Sadly, what atmosphere there will be at Old Trafford, Bramall Lane and every other ground this FA Cup fourth round weekend will either be piped in via television or generated out on the pitch by the managers and players.

COVID-19 presumably also precludes Plymouth recreating an old FA Cup gesture of theirs mentioned by Foxsmith. Drawn at Arsenal in 1932, Argyle arrived at Highbury, as the Western Morning News had it, cheered on by the “London Devonians and London Cornish”, those on the hundreds of “excursions” from Plymouth and presented their hosts with a giant pasty. It was “huge” and “decorated in Argyle colours!”

The crowd roared, all 65,311 of them.

(Top photo: Steve Bardens/Getty Images)

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Woodleyclaret » Sat Jan 23, 2021 2:15 pm

And all us Burnley fans remember Alan Moore scoring at Loftus Rd v Fulham in the FA cup followed by us knocking Fulham out in the replay

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by jrgbfc » Sat Jan 23, 2021 2:36 pm

Good article. The novelty of football without fans has well and truly worn off for me now. Apart from our games i've completely lost interest.

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by scouseclaret » Sat Jan 23, 2021 3:44 pm

I don’t think they need to worry about fans losing the habit of going away. I think most fans are dying to go to a game again and will soon get back into the routine - home or away.

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Burnleyareback2 » Sat Jan 23, 2021 6:41 pm

My last away game was Spurs, train from Manchester straight down there and straight back.

Getting to the stage now where you can’t really comprehend a day like that, traveling huge crowds everywhere and watching football!

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by claretinatherton » Sat Jan 23, 2021 7:59 pm

I can’t wait to be allowed to the away games. Meeting with fellow Clarets, having a few beers and watching the game.

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by elwaclaret » Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:03 pm

Must be worrying for clubs that they don’t get a generation who have no interest in watching live over watching live broadcast.
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by ClaretTony » Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:34 pm

I miss the away trips. As the article emphasises it’s not the 90 mins but the whole day. I miss the home games but nothing like as much as the away trips.
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by paulatky » Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:42 pm

Think a lot of fans, especially those with families will realign their priorities in regards to watching live football.

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Dark Cloud » Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:52 pm

I've been so, so glad of that week end I had in Newcastle right at the end of February last year. The match wasn't brilliant, but the pubs, the beer, the mates and the laughs were and I've absolutely no idea when or even if, it will ever happen again!

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by ClaretTony » Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:58 pm

Dark Cloud wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:52 pm
I've been so, so glad of that week end I had in Newcastle right at the end of February last year. The match wasn't brilliant, but the pubs, the beer, the mates and the laughs were and I've absolutely no idea when or even if, it will ever happen again!
Only five weeks now and it’s a year ago

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by ksrclaret » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:04 pm

Dark Cloud wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:52 pm
I've been so, so glad of that week end I had in Newcastle right at the end of February last year. The match wasn't brilliant, but the pubs, the beer, the mates and the laughs were and I've absolutely no idea when or even if, it will ever happen again!
Not just about football, but there's very little point in carrying on if we never get those things back. I don't want to just exist within four walls. I want to live.

Just my thoughts of course, but I am desperate to get back to watching live football in a packed stadium. Absolutely desperate.
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Dark Cloud » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:04 pm

ClaretTony wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:58 pm
Only five weeks now and it’s a year ago
Exactly Tony and obviously at the time we'd no idea it would be a last hoorah! Rather like the Spurs home game immediately after when I had a really good day having a few pints in Tod before travelling back to Burnley for the tea time kick off. Again, absolutely no idea what would very shortly follow and that an afternoon out with mates and a few beers before going to The Turf would seem such an alien thing and almost like something from a bygone age.

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Jakubclaret » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:09 pm

paulatky wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:42 pm
Think a lot of fans, especially those with families will realign their priorities in regards to watching live football.
Spot on & precise, the longer anything continues you become accustomed to it by nature & habit, if you used to spend x amount of pounds every week or in some cases twice a week & now you’ve probably realised what you are saving by not going, it obviously comes at a cost in terms of not enjoying the match day experience, but serious considerations will be given now whether to continue or just jack it in, certainly spend less will be at the forefront if you are relatively cash strapped to begin with & the realisation of what you was spending will hit home with people, especially with the wife’s & girlfriends smelling blood & pestering for new furniture & everyday upgrades.

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Buxtonclaret » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:10 pm

elwaclaret wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:03 pm
Must be worrying for clubs that they don’t get a generation who have no interest in watching live over watching live broadcast.
That's been one of my own personal arguments about 'wall to wall TV coverage' of football for a long time.
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Dark Cloud » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:19 pm

paulatky wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:42 pm
Think a lot of fans, especially those with families will realign their priorities in regards to watching live football.
This is said a lot Paul, but for me, after an initial spell where I was quite prepared to accept that in terms of a world pandemic, football was probably very insignificant, I actually increasingly miss going to games, both home and away and as CT says, it's not just the 90 minutes, it's the whole day or even week end. When I was young we traveled to away games in the car. We worked out how long it took to get there and set off accordingly, arriving about half an hour before kick off if my dad or my mate's dad got it right. Almost everybody did the same. But things had changes for the vast majority of fans and the game has (had) become simply the focal point of a whole day or week end. My favourite kick off time at The turf had become 5.30 on a Saturday because I could go to meet mates at lunchtime and have a really good "social" afternoon before the game. The game is obviously still massive, but it's not absolutely everything about the day. Hence I'm missing a whole lot more than just the 90 minutes. And I think I miss it more when I see things like Thursday night and imagine if we'd actually been there!!!
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by scouseclaret » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:27 pm

It seems like a lifetime at the moment, but hopefully it will turn out to be a season and a half - not really that long in a lifetime of watching football, nor I think to create a “generation of armchair fans”, particularly when they realise that, normally, not all games are on the telly.

Seriously, who isn’t looking forward to the day when they can to a match again? I appreciate some peoples’ financial circumstances might have changed, but I really think most people will get back into it with enthusiasm.
Last edited by scouseclaret on Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by GodIsADeeJay81 » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:28 pm

I miss the chance to make more memories with my 2 teenage boys.
One of them is now 18 and said he wants to be able to have a beer with me at a game.

We had season tickets for the year we finished 7th and we still talk about a lot of the none football things we saw/experienced that season.
The West Ham game still gets regular mentions for the protests, pitch invasions etc.
The Spurs game at Wembley gets mentioned because of the antics of a fellow Burnley fan who was sat conducting the Spurs fans with his middle fingers etc and we were sat next to the spurs fans.
My youngest lad taking a liking to the curry pies at our cup game away to City when we had 6k or so fans there and then being ill the day after because the pies didn't agree with him :lol:
The night game midweek at Bournemouth was also fondly remembered because it was a night game and they were back in school the next day bragging to their mates where they'd been that night.

Those things, and others, are more often than not remembered over the results.

It would be great to get the chance to do more of the same, that's all I'm after tbh, but I do understand why some people may struggle to get back into a habit of attending games regularly.
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Vegas Claret » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:31 pm

ClaretTony wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 8:34 pm
I miss the away trips. As the article emphasises it’s not the 90 mins but the whole day. I miss the home games but nothing like as much as the away trips.
for the majority or our trawl around the lower reaches it could never be about the games, they were mostly dreadful ! :lol:
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by ClaretTony » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:31 pm

Just imagine that moment at Anfield. We’ve won 1-0, the home fans have left and the Burnley players come over to the Anfield Road end and virtually no Burnley fans have left.

How do you ever describe that moment to someone who doesn’t go to football? You are sharing it with your mates, the ones you have had your day out with. The feeling, the emotion, the togetherness. Sheer joy, sheer wonderment.
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Dark Cloud » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:38 pm

ClaretTony wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:31 pm
Just imagine that moment at Anfield. We’ve won 1-0, the home fans have left and the Burnley players come over to the Anfield Road end and virtually no Burnley fans have left.

How do you ever describe that moment to someone who doesn’t go to football? You are sharing it with your mates, the ones you have had your day out with. The feeling, the emotion, the togetherness. Sheer joy, sheer wonderment.
It was the ONLY thing missing from Thursday, but boy was it missing!!!

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Stockbrokerbelt » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:40 pm

I fly in from Spain & try for about 10 home games a season, was based in Macclesfield until 2 years ago & miss mates & the buzz of the Turf on match day, sadly miss the mate i sat with for 25 years who passed away
last Jan but still sit with his son & step daughter which is fantastic. Football is only football because of the supporters, sadly clubs especially the big ones forget about that.

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by ClaretTony » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:43 pm

Dark Cloud wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:38 pm
It was the ONLY thing missing from Thursday, but boy was it missing!!!
And it’s a huge miss. The last away match we went to was crap but the five of us had a superb day out. I’ve not seen one of the other four since and another I saw most recently one week later. These are my friends who I want to share the football experience with.

When we beat Sheffield United recently the second half was a tough watch as we hung on to our lead. I texted them afterwards and said I’d realised I don’t like football; I love going to football.
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Dark Cloud » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:51 pm

I actually think what happened on Thursday night brought how I'm increasingly feeling into sharper focus because it was an amazing night and an amazing achievement and the only thing missing was us! And like you I have mates I haven't seen in almost a year now because football was where and how we met up. Certain people opted not to go on the Newcastle away trip (Bigredrose for one) and probably regret it now as there's no chance of anything like it happening in the near or even medium term future.

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by tim_noone » Sat Jan 23, 2021 9:57 pm

December 2019.....Thousands ticked spurs off the list as they do.....awful result 5..0 great weekend. 2 weeks Later Bournemouth away 1,800 away fans foul Weather playing the dyche Way P!ssing their fans off...90th minute Winner. Fantastic scenes Pope tearing his shirt off and flexing....Described in the press as the worst premiership Game Ever.maybe but it kick started our season.glad I was there......

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Garnerssoap » Sat Jan 23, 2021 10:55 pm

I don’t miss Man City away

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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Bin Ont Turf » Sat Jan 23, 2021 11:14 pm

Garnerssoap wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 10:55 pm
I don’t miss Man City away
I don't miss most of them (in this league). If I want sit and just clap, I'd go to the cricket. It always has to be about the day out, not just the match.

Although we all missed out with that at Anfield on Thursday. 8-)

willsclarets
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by willsclarets » Sun Jan 24, 2021 10:11 am

The only time I've been to Man City away is when we drew 2-2 after being 2-0 down at half time. I think I'll stay away, that was a cracking day and I don't want the memory tarnished!

bfccrazy
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by bfccrazy » Sun Jan 24, 2021 12:37 pm

It’s definitely an interesting thought and I can agree with a lot of what has been posted on here.

Somebody mentioned about “losing a generation” and Incan see this with my nephew who’s nearly 16 and has had a season ticket for years and is at an age where this lack of football has got him to a point where he’s not bothered about going on the games anymore every week as he has other things planned to do at weekends.

Personally, I miss seeing my family more regularly as I had moved out of the area a few months before lockdown 1 and keeping my season ticket made me come
Back and see family and friends every other week at least. I honestly can’t wait to get back on the turf but I don’t think I’ll renew my season ticket for too long to be honest.

I’ve had a season ticket for about 20 years or so but have realised there is so much other stuff I can’t wait to do once “allowed” - I’ll be back in Burnley at weekends but will probably spend more time with loved ones than a hello in the afternoon and then off to the match and a quick tea time goodbye to the family to drive home.

People always say “you don’t know what you got til it’s gone....” but I’ve found it more of a “you don’t appreciate who/what is important til you can’t do it as easily”

I’ll probably pick and choose matches to go on and get a few more away days in and make a weekend of them
With either my nephew in tow or even the Mrs or get the lads to get involved and have a good day out somewhere.

I don’t actually miss the live football in a stadium - I miss the people that made it special.

If I could had to choose between the people and the sport, it would be the people for me every time.

Zom Zom
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Zom Zom » Sun Jan 24, 2021 1:21 pm

Personally, I have turned away from watching matches played to empty stadiums. The absence of the supporters, whoever's playing, leaves a huge chasm. The artificial 'crowd noise' that some broadcasters give you just doesn't do anything for me. Subsequently I have reverted to Radio 5 Live so I can maybe do other things while listening.

We need people back in the stadiums. That sudden burst of raw energy and emotion when a goal is scored cannot be recreated artificially.

expoultryboy
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by expoultryboy » Sun Jan 24, 2021 1:45 pm

I miss City away for the chicken balti pies !

tim_noone
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by tim_noone » Sun Jan 24, 2021 1:59 pm

bfccrazy wrote:
Sun Jan 24, 2021 12:37 pm
It’s definitely an interesting thought and I can agree with a lot of what has been posted on here.

Somebody mentioned about “losing a generation” and Incan see this with my nephew who’s nearly 16 and has had a season ticket for years and is at an age where this lack of football has got him to a point where he’s not bothered about going on the games anymore every week as he has other things planned to do at weekends.

Personally, I miss seeing my family more regularly as I had moved out of the area a few months before lockdown 1 and keeping my season ticket made me come
Back and see family and friends every other week at least. I honestly can’t wait to get back on the turf but I don’t think I’ll renew my season ticket for too long to be honest.

I’ve had a season ticket for about 20 years or so but have realised there is so much other stuff I can’t wait to do once “allowed” - I’ll be back in Burnley at weekends but will probably spend more time with loved ones than a hello in the afternoon and then off to the match and a quick tea time goodbye to the family to drive home.

People always say “you don’t know what you got til it’s gone....” but I’ve found it more of a “you don’t appreciate who/what is important til you can’t do it as easily”

I’ll probably pick and choose matches to go on and get a few more away days in and make a weekend of them
With either my nephew in tow or even the Mrs or get the lads to get involved and have a good day out somewhere.

I don’t actually miss the live football in a stadium - I miss the people that made it special.

If I could had to choose between the people and the sport, it would be the people for me every time.
Once a Burnley Fan always a Burnley Fan.....And The offerings on TV are very poor these days. Staged and sanatised..crack on with the Away day journeys when were able. Like CT and others say it's the Social side of things travelling away and the big I was there moments..Beating Chelsea away in the Cup....Man utd last year etc. Dont give up on Burnley.

bfccrazy
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by bfccrazy » Sun Jan 24, 2021 9:07 pm

tim_noone wrote:
Sun Jan 24, 2021 1:59 pm
Once a Burnley Fan always a Burnley Fan.....And The offerings on TV are very poor these days. Staged and sanatised..crack on with the Away day journeys when were able. Like CT and others say it's the Social side of things travelling away and the big I was there moments..Beating Chelsea away in the Cup....Man utd last year etc. Dont give up on Burnley.
You know me well enough to know I couldn’t ever “give up” on Burnley. I’ll probably get more away days in though and enjoy the journeys and memories more whilst making them a weekend away.
This user liked this post: tim_noone

Roger1960
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Re: Travelling to support a football club is a habit and it's been broken

Post by Roger1960 » Sun Jan 24, 2021 11:08 pm

Me and my now 16 year old son try to get to as many away matches as we can but one sticks in my memory which was the first match of the 2017 season away at Chelsea,they were champions so I was very unfussed about going to watch us getting a stuffing. But he nagged so we went , we were early into London so went to a sports bar to watch the early kick off and got into a chat with a Luton fan and his wife who wished us good luck but didnt rate our chances. My next memory is half time in the bogs with fans saying pinch me how is this happening. The atmosphere then and the end was unforgettable and my boy still remembers it . The other one that really sticks in my memory is hull away Boxing Day 3 0 stuffing and us fighting our way home through all the flooding then not losing again until me and him are on the pitch at charlton celebrating the championship . Away days are special

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